BRISTOL, Conn. -- More than four months after being left out of the 2014 U.S. World Cup squad, Landon Donovan still believes that the snub was unjust.
"I didn't agree and I still know I should have been there," Donovan told a packed news conference in a studio on ESPN's campus on Friday afternoon.
U.S. coach Jurgen Klinsmann cut Donovan, the country's all-time scoring leader and a veteran of the 2002, '06 and '10 tournaments, in late May. The team went on to reach the knockout round in Brazil before being eliminated by Belgium in the Round of 16.
At the time, the decision appeared to signal the end of Donovan's 15-year national team career.
But when he announced in August his intention to retire from the sport at the end of the current MLS season, U.S. Soccer president Sunil Gulati reached out to Donovan to gauge his interest in playing one more game with the national team.
Eventually, Donovan agreed to make his 157th and final appearance, which will come on Friday against Ecuador (7 p.m. ET ESPN/WatchESPN) in nearby East Hartford, Connecticut.
"The thought of being in this environment again didn't seem all that appealing at the time," Donovan said. "But there's hard moments in life and I've been the beneficiary of mostly great moments in my soccer career, being treated very well most of my career, being selected when perhaps I shouldn't have been for game or a team.
"I've had the benefit of the doubt most of my career and this time it went against me and it was difficult. But at the end of the day I looked at the big picture and realized what a special day this could be."
On Thursday, Klinsmann was asked if he had had any regrets or second thoughts about leaving Donovan, who has 10 goals and 17 assists for the Galaxy since being cut, out of the World Cup squad.
The coach said he did not.
"You always make a decision based on what you see in that specific moment in time," Klinsmann said. [Donovan hadn't scored in five games for L.A. heading into the pre-Cup camp.] "In that moment in May was the picture for us was very clear and we were 100 percent behind the decision we made. I wouldn't make any other decision, and we proved that point in Brazil."
Gulati, who hired Klinsmann in 2011, first met Donovan in 1998. The two have grown close over the years, with Gulati characterizing their relationship as a friendship.
When asked by ESPN FC in May for his reaction to Klinsmann's decision, Gulati declined to comment.
He did the same on Friday.
"The reaction hasn't changed," he said. "My comment hasn't changed."